| VLADIVOSTOK, Far East -- In this sleek cafe,
with exposed brick, track lighting and a chrome-rimmed bar, you
can dine on fettuccini alfredo with salmon, sauteed mushrooms
and Black Forest cake.
Not exactly typical fare for this bedraggled Far East city of
drab, cabbage-scented cafeterias.
Even more surprising, perhaps, are the cafe's owners -- a scrap
metal dealer with scarred knuckles and a shady past, and a 25-year-old
whose father is a government bigwig.
Tucked in a courtyard at 18 Svetlanskaya Ulitsa, Vladivostok's
main street, the cafe, Studio Coffee, is one of the few wisps
of change in a wintry, tough port town that has endured political
infighting, economic chaos, electricity failures and general decay
in the decade since the Soviet collapse.
Throughout Russia, that decade saw a fierce tussle to divvy
up the country's vast property pie. The lucky few amassed tremendous
wealth virtually overnight. Now, the Wild East is becoming increasingly
tame, and businessmen are beginning to turn from thuggery to more
lawful businesses.
Studio Coffee's owners say their own move to restaurants from
the lucrative but lawless scrap metal business makes economic
sense: There is money to be made in espresso and lasagna now that
a thin layer of wealthy and middle-income Russians has emerged.
But often, the break with the past is not complete. When Andrei
Chunyak, one of the cafe's two partners, is not in the restaurant,
he is trading scrap metal, still a fairly crime-ridden industry
in Russia. Chunyak, 30, with a swaggering manner and a black leather
jacket, is vague about the specifics, referring to it simply as
his "production." He dismisses questions about connection
to organized crime.
"What you see on TV -- it's rubbish," he said, referring
to shows about the mob. "The main thieves are the bureaucrats.
They are the mafia."
But the early days were rough-and-tumble. At the beginning of
the 1990s, Chunyak said he sold used Japanese cars, a job that
required an appetite for risk and, in his words, boxing skills.
Chunyak, a tall, athletic karate specialist, looks the part.
The car business "was a disease," he said. "Everyone
was throwing themselves at it. They learned boxing and went to
the port to deal in cars. Sometimes the strong ones just took
the cars."
His softer, less athletic partner, Denis Berestovoi, has different
strengths. His father works for the regional government. Berestovoi,
25, freely acknowledges that connections with the government or
the law enforcement authorities are essential to doing business
here.
"You have to either have connections or a lot of money,"
said Berestovoi, who is quick to laugh and was wearing a button-down
shirt and khaki slacks. "Rules are from Soviet times. If
you follow them all, you'll never survive."
A craving to create something combined with the search for a
hangout that had more on the menu than just warm beer and hot
dogs gave rise to Studio Coffee.
It is housed in what had been a dilapidated storage space filled
with books. The partners hired a Moscow interior designer, trained
50 employees and drew up a Western-style menu offering hamburgers,
lasagna and espresso.
"We created this," said Berestovoi, smiling. "It
wasn't just buying and selling stuff."
The partners of Studio Coffee are not the only ones moving toward
legal business. The regional governor himself followed a similar
path. Sergei Darkin, a fast-talking 38-year-old, worked in business
before suddenly entering politics late last year.
Many have questioned his past. After college he worked in a
local port and advanced with stunning speed, becoming the head
of the port's operations and starting a leasing business called
Roliz. He headed a large regional bank and helped run a fishing
company.
His success has been attributed by some here to criminal connections,
a charge he denies.
"People say he's a bandit," said Vladimir Gilgenberg,
a former deputy in the local legislature and a newspaper editor.
"They say that all he knows is how to run a port."
But Darkin's actions have surprised even his staunchest opponents.
When he took office last summer, the region was in a shambles
after years of mismanagement by his dictatorial predecessor. Darkin
published the local budget -- previously secret -- and for the
first time in years kept the heat on all winter.
"It's easier to breathe now," said Gilgenberg, a member
of Yabloko, and a Darkin opponent. "The budget is almost
completely known to me now. Elections have become more democratic."
Despite these changes, a vast majority of the 2.2 million residents
of this region still live in poverty. Russia's economic growth
is tentative and has yet to reach most people here.
Berestovoi said he expects his clientele to increase in numbers
in the years to come. For now, the steady flow is mostly wealthy
young Russians.
"If you have come to drink coffee here, it means that you've
made it in life," he said, looking around the cafe. "Or
that your parents have."
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